1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an information display method and an information processing apparatus for preparing a document.
2. Prior Art
In a conventional information processing apparatus, the apparatus has an edition environment for displaying enlarged characters/figures in an edition picture during the editing of an edition. This edition environment displays two windows (hereinafter referred to as "window 1" and "window 2") on a display apparatus. On these windows, the same characters/figures are displayed respectively with a different display magnification rate.
Using the above edition environment, the user can practice effectively editing the edition of the character or the figure. For example, when the user prepares the character or the figure in the document, the user can practice displaying an entire page, reduced in size, in the "window 1" and, confirming a positional relationship in the page, the user can prepare the character or the figure in the "window 2".
In the above conventional information processing apparatus, during the preparation of the character or the figure, since the positional relationship in the page is clearly made, accordingly, the working efficiency of the user can be improved.
In using the above-described edition environment in the above conventional information processing apparatus, the following problems arise in the operation of the information processing apparatus.
Because plural windows are displayed on the picture of the display apparatus, the contents which are able to be displayed in one window are made small. In the above-described edition environment, it is necessary to display the contents of an entire page on the "window 1", so that the display content for the "window 2" has a narrow range.
As a result, it is disadvantageous that the user must make frequent scrolling operations when operating on "window 2".
When the user prepares the document using the above-described edition environment, in general the following handling method is used: namely, using the "window 1", the position in the page is roughly confirmed; next, the position is displayed on the "window 2"; then, after the preparation of the character and the figure using the "window 2", the layout in the page is confirmed by the "window 1".
In the above-described operation, at the step in which "the position is displayed on the "window 2"", the scrolling operations occur at the "window 2".
Further, the user must always watch which portion of the "window 1" is displayed on the "window 2". In some cases, the user makes an error in the edition by misunderstanding the above-described relationship.
To solve the above-mentioned problems, a system is proposed in, for example, Japanese patent laid-open publication No. 270384/1992. In the system shown in the above publication, a rectangular body showing the display position of the "window 2" is displayed on the "window 1". By moving this rectangular body, the contents of the "window 2" are scrolled in conjunction with movement of the rectangular body.
In this system, because the positional relationship of the enlarged displayed portion is confirmed on the reduced picture, it is considered that the last described problem of the above-mentioned problems can be overcome.
However, some range of the "window 1" is displayed on the "window 2", such that it is necessary to practice the scrolling operation so as to move the rectangular body.
The problem to be solved by the present invention, therefore, resides in that the position of the "window 1" which displays a reduced version of the whole one page, or the whole edition region, is indicated by a pointing device such as a mouse, so as to display such an indicated position on the "window 2" in which the enlarged display is performed. Thereby, it is possible to automatically scroll the contents of the "window 2".